He was cesared 5 weeks early after my wife developed a serious condition called hemolytic-uremic syndrome. It has been a tough couple of weeks but she is on the mend and should be home in a couple of days(fingers crossed).

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One practice which I have become fond of is parallel charging. I charge up to five packs at once in an hour at home and this is enough for a flying session, about one hour.

This is how i do it;

First, I equilibrate the batteries to each other by connecting them in parallel with a resistor on each positive lead. The resistor is to stop a huge current going into any battery due to difference in voltage potential. This process takes about 1/2 an hour.

Second, I connect the batteries in parallel on my charging harness and charge them at a value equal to the sum of the capacities of the batteries.

Simple!

It would seem that parallel charging packs of similar capacity is the ideal, hence the rationalising of batteries.

Since I started e-flight I have aquired over thirty lipos.

3 @ 2S 300mah, so so.

5 @ 2S 500mah, good.

4 @ 2S 2000mah, brand new.

2 @ 3S 450mah, good.

3 @ 3S 700mah, good.

3 @ 3S 800mah, junk.

3 @ 3S 1200mah, good.

6 @ 3S 1250mah, half still good.

2 @ 3S 1350mah, never used them, GWS 6C

1 @ 3S 1800mah, so so.

4 @ 3S 2000mah, good.

2 @ 4S 2200mah, were never any good.

What I intend to do is only replace

2S 500mah

3S 1200mah

and soon I will start using A123's, these I will place in 5S packs.

The 2S 500mah will be for 5oz foamies and small scale.

The 3S 1200mah will be for all my 10-20oz 3D, aerobatic and scale craft, paralleled for two 30oz 3D ships.

The A123's are for my ducted fans which are gathering dust and anything bigger I build.